The Fall of Jerusalem

The king of Babylon was very intent and earnest on the siege of Jerusalem. He built towers on great mounds of earth and from them drove back those who stood on the walls; and he raised a great number of such mounds all around the city, as high as its walls. Yet those inside bore the siege with courage and eagerness. They were not discouraged either by the famine or by the plague, but kept up their spirits in carrying on the war, though those miseries within pressed hard on them too. They did not let themselves be terrified either by the enemy’s devices or by his engines of war, but kept devising new engines to oppose to every one of theirs, until there really seemed to be a full contest between the Babylonians and the people of Jerusalem over which had the greater cleverness and skill. The one side supposed that by this means they would get the better of the other and destroy the city; the other placed its hope of deliverance in nothing but persisting in such inventions against them as might show that the enemy’s engines were useless. They endured this siege for eighteen months, until they were destroyed by the famine and by the missiles the enemy threw at them from the towers. [a]

The city was taken on the ninth day of the fourth month, in the eleventh year of the reign of Zedekiah. It was in fact only generals of the king of Babylon who took it, for Nebuchadnezzar had entrusted the siege to them and stayed himself in the city of Riblah. The names of these generals who ravaged and subdued Jerusalem, if anyone wishes to know them, were these: Nergal-sharezer, Aremantus, Samgar, Nabosaris and Acharampsaris. The city was taken about midnight. When the enemy’s generals had entered the temple and Zedekiah realized it, he took his wives, his children, his captains and his friends, and fled with them out of the city through the strong ravine and through the desert. When some of the deserters had told the Babylonians of this, they hurried at daybreak to pursue Zedekiah, overtook him not far from Jericho, and surrounded him. As for the friends and captains of Zedekiah who had fled from the city with him, when they saw their enemies near them they left him and scattered, some one way and some another, each one determined to save himself. So the enemy took Zedekiah alive, deserted by all but a few, together with his children and his wives, and brought him to the king. When he came, Nebuchadnezzar began to call him a wicked wretch and a breaker of covenants, one who had forgotten his former words when he promised to keep the country for him. He also reproached him for his ingratitude: that having received the kingdom from him, who had taken it from Jehoiachin and given it to him, he had used the power he gave him against the one who gave it. “But God is great, who hated that conduct of yours and has brought you under us.” When he had said this to Zedekiah, he ordered his sons and his friends to be killed while Zedekiah and the other captives looked on. After this he put out Zedekiah’s eyes, bound him, and carried him to Babylon. These things happened to him as Jeremiah and Ezekiel had foretold to him: that he would be caught and brought before the king of Babylon, and would speak to him face to face and see his eyes with his own eyes; so far Jeremiah prophesied. But he was also blinded and brought to Babylon, yet did not see it, as Ezekiel had predicted. [b]

We have said this much because it is enough to show the nature of God to those who are ignorant of it: that it is varied and acts in many different ways, that all events happen in a regular order and in their proper season, and that it foretells what must come to pass. It is also enough to show the ignorance and unbelief of men, by which they are not allowed to foresee anything that is to come, and are exposed without any guard to calamities, so that it is impossible for them to avoid experiencing them.

In this way the kings of David’s line ended their lives. They were twenty-one in number, down to the last king, and all together they reigned five hundred and fourteen years, six months and ten days. Of them Saul, their first king, held the government twenty years, though he was not of the same tribe as the rest. [h]

And now the king of Babylon sent Nebuzaradan, the general of his army, to Jerusalem to plunder the temple. He also had orders to burn it and the royal palace, to level the city with the ground, and to transplant the people to Babylon. So he came to Jerusalem in the eleventh year of King Zedekiah and plundered the temple. He carried out the vessels of God, both gold and silver, and in particular the great basin that Solomon dedicated, and also the bronze pillars and their capitals, with the golden tables and the lampstands. When he had carried these off, he set fire to the temple in the fifth month, on the first day of the month, in the eleventh year of the reign of Zedekiah and the eighteenth year of Nebuchadnezzar. He also burned the palace and overthrew the city. The temple was burned four hundred and seventy years, six months and ten days after it was built. It was then one thousand and sixty-two years, six months and ten days from the departure out of Egypt. From the flood to the destruction of the temple the whole interval was one thousand nine hundred and fifty-seven years, six months and ten days; and from the birth of Adam until this happened to the temple there were four thousand five hundred and thirteen years, six months and ten days. So great was the number of years belonging to this history, and what was done during those years we have related in detail. The general of the Babylonian king now overthrew the city to its very foundations and removed all the people. He took prisoner the high priest Seraiah, Zephaniah the priest who was next to him, the rulers who guarded the temple, three in number, the eunuch who was over the armed men, seven friends of Zedekiah, his scribe, and sixty other rulers. All of these, together with the vessels they had plundered, he brought to the king of Babylon at Riblah, a city of Syria. There the king ordered the heads of the high priest and of the rulers to be cut off; but he himself led all the captives and Zedekiah to Babylon. He also led away in chains Jozadak the high priest, the son of Seraiah the high priest, whom the king of Babylon had killed at Riblah, a city of Syria, as we have just related. [i]

Now since we have listed the succession of the kings, who they were and how long they reigned, I think it necessary to set down the names of the high priests, and who they were who succeeded one another in the high priesthood under the kings. The first high priest at the temple Solomon built was Zadok. After him his son Ahimaaz received that office; after Ahimaaz came Azariah. His son was Joram, and Joram’s son was Ios; after him came Axioramus. His son was Phideas, Phideas’s son was Sudeas, Sudeas’s son was Juelus, Juelus’s son was Jotham, Jotham’s son was Urijah, Urijah’s son was Nerias, Nerias’s son was Odeas, his son was Shallum, Shallum’s son was Hilkiah, Hilkiah’s son was Azariah, and his son was Jozadak, who was carried captive to Babylon. All these received the high priesthood by succession, the sons from their fathers. [n]

When the king had come to Babylon, he kept Zedekiah in prison until he died, and then buried him magnificently. He dedicated the vessels he had plundered from the temple at Jerusalem to his own gods, and settled the people in the country of Babylon; but he freed the high priest from his chains.